Caught in the Twilight (or what we did on the beach)
by Kfhlhckvifkbduvl
Summary: They all have memories of the beach. Except Shiro, who has memories of blood. A beach episode, set after the Balmera arc in season 1. Lots of angst and character analysis followed by fluff. Klance if you squint. Multichapter
1. Chapter 1

Answering this distress call was a really bad idea.

"Is Lance through?"

Static.

"Allura, tell me is Lance throu-"

A plasma blast catches the Black Lion full on the right side; Shiro tastes blood as his head is slammed to the left. The controls are wrenched out of his hands and Black is caught in a spiral, a mayfly swirling down the drain.

"Shiro. Shiro, come in! Are you still there?"

Shiro rights himself and grabs the controls again; the bionic arm flexes with a strength that is not his own, and Black turns the downward spiral into an elegant swoop around the nearest moon. Behind him the Galra fighters crackle like a bug zapper, and he knows they've just missed another plasma blast.

"I'm here, Allura. Where's Lance?"

"Right. Yes, of course. Lance made it back fine. The particle barrier's still holding. Keith has time."

"You hear that, Keith?"

"On my way."

Shiro twists and Black pivots, fires off two shots of his own, and dives, letting the moon's gravity pull them down. This time Shiro feels the plasma rake his hindquarters.

That's the problem with the whole psychic bond thing. He grimaces as another barrage pockmarks the ground where Black had been standing a second before. With Earth craft he hadn't felt every little scratch on the paintwork.

Shiro grins. If he had, he probably wouldn't have survived the simulator.

His HUD beeps; Keith is in its crosshairs as he speeds across the void, weaving around a clump of asteroid shrapnel that had just a second ago been another moon. Two of the Galra fighters break off and scream after him. Keith leaves them eating lunar dust.

Damn, that kid can fly.

Plasma flares in his peripheral, and Shiro feels Black's growl rumble through his chest. Right. Run now, admire later. Keith would actually be much better at this whole laser tag thing, he thinks wryly, looping around and swiping one of his pursuers on the flyby. Black's claws shred it like a paper knife and the fighter goes down.

Keith has the faster lion and, Shiro isn't ashamed to admit, is the better pilot by a considerable margin: they could easily have swapped places; Hunk charged the blockade first, scattering them like bowling pins. Then Pidge, the smallest, then Lance. Shiro could've followed. It made tactical sense. But Shiro is the leader, and that means laying down on the wire and letting the other guys walk over you.

Another explosion rattles his bones.

Yay, him. Perks of being in charge.

"Hello? Hello, Shiro? Keith just docked, you need to move now!"

Allura's voice is high and frantic, and Shiro is reminded of just how young she is. Younger than him. Everyone is younger than him now, except Coran. How did he suddenly become so old?

An asteroid sailing past shatters like glass, and Shiro decides he's not old enough yet. Not old enough to die. Black wheels about, the bionic arm slams the accelerator forward, and Shiro is caught as it yanks him along with it. Black's whole body _thrums_ , and they rocket back towards the blockade, with the Castle waiting just beyond.

The swarm of persuing fighters parts like water, and they're going to make it, his team is screaming encouragement in his ears -

There is a crackle. His stomach drops. Shiro feels it, in the taste of the air, the way you feel it the moment before a lightning strike. He yanks the controls upward -

And the hand of a giant sweeps them away, white and purple and glaring.

Alarms shriek. The world is red, and flashing and purple. Purple, the arm has woken itself, like a dog straining at the leash. Every time he gets scared - Calm, calm. Blaring alarms. Shut _up_ , Black, I know, I'm thinking, let me _think_ -

Shiro presses down, biting his lip as if to suppress a scream. The purple glow retreats, reluctantly. The alarms have stopped, but the ringing in his head hasn't. There's a jackhammer drilling through his temple.

The air crackles again, and the solid mass of purple light misses them by a millimetre. Another moon is made a cloud, Shiro feels the shudder. A command ship; the Galra have called reinforcements. Too slow, he took too much time -

Black races away, from the attack and from him, before they can fire again, before Shiro can regain his wits.

 _Come on_ , his Lion tells him. _You are the leader of the pride. You cannot be weak or confused or human. You are the alpha predator._ An alpha predator, reduced to a firefly lost in wave of fireworks.

Shiro takes the controls, with both hands. Both. Pain, in his head, through his head. No pain. Pain is not permitted.

 _Our enemies have evolved_ , Black growls at the base of his skull, and Shiro feels ten thousand years of absence and vulnerability and cancerous growth wash over him.

 _Can you?_

The air crackles again, almost gleefully, but this time he's ready. He banks, and Black pinwheels out of the way, a water skater dodging a stone thrown by a petulant child. Reload time is three seconds. He must've counted, though he didn't notice. Always awake. Never resting, even asleep.

Shiro has an opening. He takes it. The bionic arm thrusts forward and this time he's behind it, the hunter unsheathing his claws. The command ship is a blur of shadow on the right, then nothing.

The blockade is regrouping. It won't be enough, can't let it be. On the other side their pride is waiting. Shiro roars, the lion within and without in perfect harmony, and the arm flares up in symphony. A beam of icy blue thunders from their open maw and they burst through the blockade like it's a house of cards, scattered to the wind.

They've made it. Keith and Red have come back out to meet them (of course they have), the Castle scoops them up, they're through the hangar doors -

Shiro sighs and slumps against his seat, deboned.

Made it.

For once, sleep takes him willingly.

...

Weirdly, Hunk is the only one not having a meltdown. Lance has lost the smile Hunk thought was a permanent part of his face, Pidge is breathing too fast and Keith's face is so tight Hunk worries it might crack.

Not him, though. There's something strangely therapeutic about charging a wall of Galra death head on. Puts things into perspective. Now they've wormholed away, he'll probably get around to wetting his pants later, when the adrenaline high wears off.

But Allura, she's the worst. All the color has drained from her face, to the very tips of her ears. She looks more like a ghost than her dead dad downstairs.

They watch in silence as Coran and Keith manhandle Shiro into a healing pod, like a marrionette with its strings all tangled. Lance stands by, not sure what to do with himself. The stasis field bubbles over Shiro's fluttering eyelids, and Hunk can't help thinking of the coffin at a funeral. He's only ever been to one funeral, his grandmother's, and he was only six at the time. It was nice, actually. Mom had cooked Grandma's favourite afterwards, as a way to say goodbye.

Still doesn't change the way Shiro looks like literal death. Or how much the noises he's making sound like a tortured mouse. Pidge's lip is trembling, but Hunk pretends he can't see. She won't apreciate concern right now.

"Is he going to be alright?" Allura asks. She sounds a liitle hollow. Hunk can't blame her, but she'll probably be blaming herself. Answering that distress beacon was her idea. Against Shiro's recommendations. That must be eating her up.

Coran tries for a warm smile. Those usually work, but today she stares right through it.

"Out cold is all. Probably got a nasty migraine, but he'll be fit as a fiddle within two swipes of a bogtail's... uh, thingy." He made a vague flapping gesture, "Anyway, the best thing you can do now is get some rest. You've been up for nineteen quintaks straight now, all of you."

Nobody moves. Shiro's shallow breathing holds them hypnotised.

 _inout inout inout inout_ -

Hunk shakes himself like a dog throwing off cold rain. Sleep. They've been up too long, with training, the botched mission and the following standoff. He watches Pidge sway on her feet, only propped up by empty horror. They all need rest.

"Guys, Coran's got a point."

Lance jerks, awoken from a trance. He stares at Hunk blankly for a second before making the connection. Then he nods and slopes off. Keith trails behind. Pidge stays rooted to the spot.

Hunk comes over and rests a hand on her shoulder.

"Come on, there's nothing more you can do."

She flinches away.

"I'm staying," she says stubbornly. Hunk sighs.

"If you stay, you won't be awake when he gets better."

Pidge takes a breath, and then seems to melt on the spot, like a candle burning too long. Hunk figures that's as close to yes as he's going to get, so he bends down and hoists her onto his back. She doesn't resist.

He turns to talk to Allura, but she's planted herself like a tree, sitting at the base of Shiro's pod. Her eyes are sharp, like just-broken glass. Hunk gestures helplessly to Coran, who nods and ushers him to leave. Probably best to leave them alone for some alien bonding time.

He reajusts Pidge like a backpack and steps into the elevator. She doesn't talk, which is unusual. Normally she can't wait to regale the only other techie on board with little tidbits she's discovered while tinkering with the Castle, when Coran isn't looking. Shiro is second family to her, Hunk knows. The last link to her missing one. Watching helplessly as the Galra almost severed it again can't have been fun.

Still, they're family too, Hunk muses, as the elevator opens and he steps out onto the accommodation floor. Pidge's room is right at the end, with an extra room between her and everyone else for the junk she claims are 'experiments in progress'. Hunk doesn't mind; she weighs less than a feather.

I mean, he'd always wanted a baby sister. He just hadn't expected her to be smarter than him. Or pretend to be a boy first. Speaking of, he really should start calling her Katie. It is her real name, after all.

But it doesn't really seem to fit, like reaching the last gap in a jigsaw puzzle only to find the peice you have doesn't match up. Pidge is Pidge. Anything else seems a little... off. Or painful. Maybe that's why she doesn't correct them. The reminder of what she's lost hurts too much.

They pass Keith's room, he's probably already inside, getting a head start on the night's brooding, and Lance, just slipping out of his in those awesome, Castle-fabricated slippers. He makes a sickly cooing face at the sight of Pidge clinging to Hunk's back like a baby monkey (Hunk can only assume she's fallen asleep, otherwise he'd have been punched) and Hunk rolls his eyes good naturedly. Then Shiro's quaters, whose open door gapes like an empty maw.

Finally, casa de la Pidge. Hunk picks his way through the minefield of wiring and empty not-candy wrappers (the 'experiment' room must be overflowing). Delicately, he lifts her off his back and sets her down on the foam matress, before doing the mandatory check for hidden bits of tech. There's one laptop stowed under the bed and a couple of circuit boards stashed against the wall. There's probably tons more, but Shiro's the only one who can ever find it all.

Hunk pauses on his way out, and glances back. Yes, a baby sibling would be nice, boy or girl.

The light spilling in from the halway catches the glass photo frame on her bedside table. Her and her brother - Matt, he remembers. Hunk snorts a little, remembering how he'd mistaken Matt for Pidge. But they _do_ look a lot alike, her sleeping face side by side with his, bright and smiling.

Hunk frowns as he heads back down the hall to his own bed. If the memory of her family is so painful she doesn't even use the same name, then why does she still cut her hair and wear glasses she doesn't need?

Why look exactly like the pain she's trying to hide?

...

Allura is glad for the chance to be weak.

Coran has gone to set the Castle down somewhere habitable, leaving her with some kind words she didn't hear and a warm drink she hasn't touched. She is alone in every way.

It's tiring, the strain of keeping it hidden, like sucking in a gut. She releases, and all of the emotion sort of flops out, the weight dragging her down. No tears. She doesn't have enough to spare, what with her father and her people and her planet -

Her face resets into something droopier, and although it doesn't exactly feel good, neither is using a leech to siphon poison from the blood. She'll survive. She has to, now. It's her duty.

Allura looks up at Shiro, waxen skin, mouth made a razor by pain, and she suddenly feels the need to scream. Her duty. It's funny, really, like a joke at a funeral, how much better off everyone would be if it was him in her place instead. This alien, with his bleached hair and his battle scars and his abnormal ears.

Allura sees herself in her mind's eye, the flickering of an old hologram.

 _She is running down a corridor, in another part of the Castle. Coran is still on the bridge with Keith, running the Castle's first diagnostic check in ten thousand years. Lance and Hunk have gone for the Yellow Lion, and Shiro, Shiro is away with Pidge..._

 _Quick now, time is a candle burning at both ends. There is vengance broiling molten in her gut and she must know..._

 _The hangar door is sheer and unyeilding. Behind it the Black Lion waits, she knows but could not see._

 _She reaches out, tentative. Take a breath. Focus. Clear headed. A natural leader. This is what it needs. She takes the magma in her stomach and channels it, up her arm and through her fingertips. She lays them flat and firm on the cold metal._

Open.

 _Shut. The door does not budge, refuses to let her through. Allura's eyes narrow and she forces her strength through, trying to communicate, trying to make the Lion see -_

 _The Blue Lion was taken already, she has lost her childhood friend. But she is a leader now, the leader, the hope of her people (except there is no-one left to lead), she could fight, she could avenge them. She bites her lip and presses harder, as if hoping to melt her way through the metal. The Lion will see, why won't it -_

 _The magma runs dry and all Allura has left to give is raw and wet and grieving. She snatches her hand away, scared it has known her weakness and thought her unworthy._

 _Too late. Too little. She imagines the Lion standing just beyond her reach, monolithic, unmoved. She might as well appeal to a mountain range. Her grief escapes her in a single droplet, because now it has nowhere else to go. She swipes at her eyes and turns away. The candle is almost spent. Coran will be looking for her._

 _Shiro will be back soon._

What is she, really? She's not the diplomat her father was, she obviously isn't the commander she needs to be. Shiro groans and tosses in his sleep. Allura flinches. She needs Shiro. He is the lynch pin. The Black Paladin always is. That's why no-one could fight Zarkon before, because he was the key to their defence.

Allura relies on Shiro more than she'd like. He is her rock, the team's rock, solid and real where her father is nothing but hollow light. She wonders if he ever trusted Zarkon the way she's coming to trust Shiro. He must have.

She risks another glance at Shiro's pod. A purple light simmers inside, like a furnace turned low. His arm has awoken itself. She keeps her eyes trained on it, this piece of monster fused to her friend.

Something rattles in the dark and Allura jerks away. It's a slippery slope, this kind of thinking. The niggling doubts at the back of her head had told her to ignore Shiro's warning, about the distress beacon. She was so sure she could save them. Altea coming to the rescue, like in the old legends.

This is the result.

They sit, facing the cavernous dark of the unlit hangar. Together. Allura lets her eyes close. She needs to trust Shiro, if she's going to defeat Zarkon.

They'll do that together, too.


	2. Chapter 2

_Shiro waits for the call to arms._

 _There are rules, to cope with the waiting. He falls back on them more and more now. Everyone has their own, if they last long enough to need them, but the single, unspoken one they all share is to never let it get to you. The waiting. The tension, in your shoulders. The sweat rolling down your cheek. Otherwise you snap._

Rule 1: Know your enemy.

 _Shiro watches the new stock scurry. There are a lot of new faces this time; the Galra have speckled fresh blood over old battle-scars to make them more gruesome. The heat is opressive. It smells like frightened animal and dead meat. Slaughterhouse smell._

 _There's an old crow-like thing leaning against the far wall, stooped over by the burden of too many victories. Shiro might've heard stories about him. It's hard to be sure; the stories they tell here (corner of the mouth, guards' not looking) dress everyone in shining armour. Every underdog is the hero to lead them to salvation._

 _Shiro doesn't need the stories. He has real things to be strong for (they were real, they will be again.)_

 _This crow is grey, though. Moulting. So few people here reach old age, it's quite the achievement. Shiro has to watch him carefully._

\- You ground the flying ones first. Take out the wings and go in with something long-range, maybe a spear, take advantage of their limited mobility and keep jabbing until they stop moving -

 _He wonders if he'll live to be that grey. A small, weak part of him hopes not. He'll go insane first._

Rule 2: Always think like you are going to win.

 _There is no second option. Don't think about it._

 _The bunker rumbles, marking the death of something big in the arena above. Dust trickles into Shiro's hair. He opressive throb of the crowd's approval in his boots._

 _The guy sitting next to him won't be grey, when he goes. His fear is the newborn kind that bawls and flails at anyone who tries to help. Wide, salamander eyes. Brown, like Matt's. Sweat. The smell of sweat is, it seems, universal. Locker room smell, at the Garrison, Matt Holt's struggling breath as he tried to keep up on the treadmill. Shiro always overtook him. He always came back -_

Rule 3: The past is your greatest ally and your greatest enemy.

 _They come to him sometimes, these flashes of normality, reality, shots of light in the dark. But reality needs to be rationed down here, like everything else._

 _The ceiling shivers again, in anticipation. The newbies panic and stumble into each other like headless chickens. The crow does not react. Shiro is certain he his being watched back now, by beady, oil-drop eyes. He keeps his head down. The acolytes have started to mutter._

 _The Galra have scattered poison over the scars too, to let them fester. Three acolytes huddle together, whispering. Shiro can't tell if their scars are from fighting or ceremony; they all look the same. The acolytes have been fighting for too long, and now the bloodlust curls permenant and greedy behind their eyes._

 _He tells himself not to hate them. They could be good, if the Galra hadn't stripped them of their own faith and herded them towards the only thing left._

\- Acolytes have killed their self preservation instincts, so take advantage of that. Keep luring them on, use the terrain, make the chase dangerous. Keep away from their hands, because they'll claw and rip like savages. Give them quick deaths. They like it when you make a show of them -

Rule 4: Never make it personal.

 _If you hate someone, you're accountable for killing them. It's not their fault._

 _Another roar from the crowd, and something screams._

 _The salamander beside him flinches with Matt Holt's eyes. The acolytes buzz louder. Their time is approaching, a chance to prove themselves to their new gods, sitting on the stands above. A consummation. Matt Holt stares at them through an alien face, like he's seeing the end of a long, dark tunnel._

 _"Don't let them change you." Shiro's voice is creaky from underuse._

 _Matt-not-Matt starts. Shiro shouldn't be saying anything._

 _"... You mean don't kill?"_

 _"No - no, you need to kill, or you'll be dead." This is funny, but Shiro finds he can't smile. Across the room, the crow has tensed. He knows what's happening. He's seen it before. So has Shiro._

 _"Then how do I not let them change me?" the kid even sounds weedy. How did he end up here? Then again, how did Shiro?_

 _"Just - hold on to what's you" (_ Rule 5 _). He's given this speech too many times, it's worked too few. But this one has Matt's eyes. He takes it as an omen. "Don't become them." Shiro indicates the accolytes, with their battle scars matting with the ones they carved themselves. "You can be better."_

 _"How?"_

 _"Fight. And hate it, feel guilty. Guilt means you're not one of their machines."_

 _Not-Matt almost laughs._

 _"I think I'm too scared to feel guilty." He freezes. Weakness._

 _"So hold onto that instead." (_ Rule 6: Everything they tell you is a weakness is just a power they don't have. _) "Fear makes you fast."_

 _Not-Matt relaxes and Shiro manages a smile. It hurts a little, around the edges._

 _"Remember who you are, and you'll make it."_

 _He can feel the crow's disapproval from across the room, waves of heat from a furnace._

Rule 7: Never make promises you can't keep.

 _But that's the problem with making your own rules. They're so easy to break._

 _The doors ground to life. A sliver of purple half-light, still bright enough to blind, creeps up the floor towards them. Not-Matt squeaks. Shiro breathes._

 _He's done this before. You hold on to the victories and cut the rest out. He glances at Matt, and tries to communicate how important their own truths are, even if they are mangled and small. Cupped hands under a leaking gutter._

 _The doors screech to a halt. The crowd bays for blood, and the acolytes lead the charge into the arena._

 _..._

The bedroom lights flicker on at 6am. Everyone else's do this at 8am, but Pidge has made a few adjustments to her personal system; she can't see the point in wasting two potentially productive hours in darkness. Now she groans awake, and blinks into the bleached glare of the laptop monitor. Her groping hand finds a pillow, and she chucks it at the nearest lamp.

Screw productivity.

The pillow bounces off, and the lamp continues to glow merrily. She glares at it for a second, before peeling their face off of the laptop and staggering into the bathroom. It's mercifully dark in here, and they let themselves slip back into low power mode, waiting for their brain to crawl back from the land of the dead. They drop their pants, and fumble around for something that isn't there.

Half a second. Brain clicks back into place. Blood turns to ice.

Shit. She groans like a zombie and drops onto the toilet lid, head in her hands. _Shit._ Why does she keep doing this to herself?

 _Katie. I am Katie,_ she tells herself. Firmly, sincerely (she tells herself).

 _Pidge, Pidge, Pidge,_ everything else whispers. Clothes, glasses, hair, binder (which she really _needs_ to stop wearing. There just never seems to be time-).

Out of the bathroom and across to the wardrobe. Everyone picked up some spare changes of clothes on their last visit to a Belt Market. Hers are plain, non-descript. No dresses, no bows. No shirts either, she reminds herself. Tries to take comfort. No boots either. They want boots, a good, sturdy pair that won't melt from plasma residue. But that seems risky, somehow. Keep it simple. Ambiguous enough to avoid the question. She has bigger things to deal with.

She climbs up onto the bed and stands on her tiptoes, sliding the laptop back into its hidey hole in the ceiling. Yet another thing she hates about being short; it cuts off all the best hiding spots. Shiro is bound to find-

Their stomach withers. She shakes herself, and leaves the room. Shiro will find the laptop, it'll be fine. Maybe as early as tonight. No way he'll let her have too much fun.

The others have already gone down to eat, by the looks of things. Shiro's empty room almost looks normal. Doesn't feel it.

The elevator swishes open and then Pidge is gliding upward, towards the mess lamps in here are on around the clock or, more accurately, round the ticker. Same thing. Not really. The light glows warm, candle light made steady. Not electric; she'd taken one apart last week (Coran had nearly fainted) so she knows they run on some kind of perpetual energy source, way beyond Earth. But, then again, what isn't out here?

The Castle uses minature suns to light its hallways. Seriously. This kind of thing is starting to get pretty familiar, actually.

The elevator door opens again and Pidge steps out, working over the possibilities. They really should ask Allura about adapting the technology for Green. Maybe some kind of self-sustaining force feild? The lions' particle barriers don't work in-flight, a serious oversight, if you ask them -

The others are waiting in the kitchen. It honestly looks like Pidge has slept best out of all of them, which is a little sad. Lance and Keith are slumped over on the same couch. The same couch, without yelling at each other, which notches things up to scary.

Hunk is by the stove, wearing the drawstring apron Lance helped him programme into the fabricator. Pidge still doesn't understand why he can't just buy one from a Belter, but maybe that particular shade of pink is hard to come by. Pidge passes him on the way to the refrigerator; Hunk's been going through an 'experimental' phase lately, and this morning he's keeping his hands busy rolling dough.

Except it's not really dough, because it's purple (Coran says he's never heard of wheat before). This is a substitute. That's getting pretty familiar, too.

Pidge opens the fridge and peruses their options. They ask the question that needs to be answered.

"How is he?"

Lance looks up. He's tired enough that the cocksure grin doesn't yet reach his eyes.

"Stable. Allura says he'll be fine. Obviously, I knew that already." He puffs out his chest a little, and Pidge will not roll their eyes, not now. "Yep, I have complete faith in our fearless leader. I mean, it's Shiro. He's been through tons worse. The guy survived a whole year of the Galra on his own."

"You mean he's still alive," Keith mutters. He's the only one still in battle armour. Lance frowns at him like he's dense.

"Yeah, that's what I said."

Keith shakes his head.

"Never mind."

"Anyway, point is, Allura says he'll make it."

"I don't know, guys," Hunk says from the stove. He's decided to fry his breakfast, (dough-ish, Pidge has christened it) and small ridges are raising on it as it spits in the oil, like the spines on a sea anemone. "Allura's ears were flat when she said it. You noticed she does that when she's scared?"

"Lance is right," Keith interrupts. Lance gapes, and Hunk has to dive to retrieve his dropped spatula. "Shiro will be fine." There's something going on with his eyes, though, something rigid Pidge can't name. Hunk probably can, but he's been distracted by the lilac bubbles congealing over his breakfast.

Pidge wolf whistles, grabbing a bottle of their own breakfast and nudging the refrigerator shut with their toe.

"Not fighting and now actually agreeing on something. Have you guys agreed on baby names yet?"

Lance splutters on air. Keith's frown deepens to Mariana Trench levels. Pidge flops down on the opposite couch and takes a swig of alien pop.

"Pidge, is that the... _pepsi_ , you've got there?" Hunk asks. Pidge gives him innocent eyes.

"Technically it's _space_ pepsi."

"You can't have pepsi for breakfast!" Hunk sputters, clutching his stomach like he's protecting his only child.

"Dude, have you seen what you're meant to be eating?" Lance seems relieved at the change of subject. Pidge can smell the dough-ish from here (squid, spinach... was that egg?) and Hunk seems to be having difficulty breathing through it. "She's actually doing better than you right now."

Pidge jolts, she jolts. Cover it up with another mouthful of pepsi (which actually tastes like warm cottage pie, but it sort of looks like pepsi, and something as weird as pie-in-a-bottle really needs to be normalised before being drunk and okay you're rambling now.) Change the subject, now, before they notice.

What about the engines? She can normally feel how fast they're going through deck vibration. No vibrations now. So -

"Where have we landed?" she asks around another mouthful. Normally she feels the shiver of touchdown from her room, but she must've missed it.

"We don't know." Keith grunts. Nobody asks her how she knew. At this point, when it comes to machines it's generally assumed Pidge is some kind of psychic. "Coran only checked for no sentient life and a breathabler atmosphere before going back down to check on Allura." He glares angrily at an innocent patch of space, like Allura has paid him personal insult. "Still too dangerous to go out, though. There could be anything out there."

Lance's eyes light up.

 _Here we go..._

He springs upwards like a rubber band and makes a show of bending backwards, like a bamboo pole. Cartilage clicks.

"Well, come on then, we're burning daylight! Quintak light. Whatever."

He strides off towards the elevator, which Pidge knows he'll take to the entrance hall and then head straight out the front door. Keith asks anyway.

"Where are you going?"

"Gonna go look around, check out the sights, get friendly with the locals." Lance winks and Keith's grip on the armrest tightens. Pidge can't hold back the eye-roll this time.

"I just said-"

"Yeah, yeah, I know what you said." Lance waves him off. "Wanna know what I say?"

"Not really," Keith says honestly. Pidge snorts into her pepsi.

"What I say is there's a whole new alien world out there. You guys realise we're the first Garrison cadets to make it beyond our own solar system? But we never get the chance to actually go exploring! It's always train now, fight this, save them, pew-pew-pew ." Lance's finger gun riddles Keith with laser holes. "Don't you want to see what's out there? I mean, I know you dropped out, but -"

"Fine," Keith snaps. He has the emotional range of a screwdriver, and can block out most of the stupidity in the universe (boy, does Pidge want that superpower), but Lance always manages to get under his skin.

Pidge slides off the couch and mooches after them, still bickering. Hunk trails behind, twiddling with his apron. The words _'My Kitchen Is My Canvas'_ are emblazoned on the front.

"Uh, guys, not sure I'm on board with this plan." He follows them into the elevator anyway, "I mean, what if we get out there and the ground is made of jell-o, and we all sink and drown in strawberry quicksand?"

"You could eat your way out," Lance offers. The elevator opens to the ground floor.

"OK, but what if, like, the planet is run by cat people who think the Lions are gods, and they hold a freaky dance party where they sacrifice us to them? Or, what if everyone looks like a clown and the circus performers have to wear make-up to look like normal people? Or-"

"Or, maybe there were some inhalable hallucinogens in your breakfast," Pidge suggests. They've reached the main doors. Lance's hand hovers over the release button for dramatic effect.

"Seriously though guys, it's going to be horrible and explodey-" The doors slide open and Hunk puts his arms up to defend from certain death. He can't look. "And there are going to be mountains of acid and carnivorous trees and... a beach. Oh. It's - a beach. Huh. OK."

Pidge steps forward, and feels the universe steal their breath away. Again.

The beach stretches on forever, a primal steak of white on a canvas of grey (cliffs - to the left) and blue (sea - to the right), left by the paintbrush of an ancient god. The sky is the too big, too empty kind, with no clouds, the kind you can believe wraps around the entire world.

But that's the boring bit. That's the not important, seen-it-before bit. The rest of it... oh.

 _Oh._

The sea is frozen. Not to ice, it's just - stopped. Waves are caught mid-break, white stallions rearing out of the depths, spray haloing the shore like hardened starlinght, catching the glint of a morning sun. Pidge looks out further, and beyond, the water dives and undulates and ripples, silk stroked by a breeze, a sheet of cobalt steel not yet hammered into shape.

It's a stormy sea, the tempest captured in a moment. It's scream chafes against the cheery sunlight, against an impossible leash, a leash it knows is impossible, and Pidge feels it's fury at this injustice hit them full in the face.

It's quite possibly the most beautiful thing they've ever seen.

Lance walks out past them, leaving what might just be the first footprints this world has ever known in sand as pure as snow. He stops. He stares. He drinks it in. A thousand different emotions are playing on his face at once. Pidge remembers why they wanted to be an astronaut.

This moment, right here. This single, perfect moment, with the world literally frozen to remember, with so much incredible _new_ bubbling up their insides-

Coran smashes the moment to pieces.

"Guys, where have you - oh, you opened the doors. Thought you'd do the environment checks yourselves did you? The old fashioned approach, nice and simple. Good-o. I'll just do some preliminary checks and - Oh." He stops beside them, gives his brain a second to register what he's seeing. But it's not wonder pulling his mouth too tight. "It's one of those."

Pidge sprang at him.

"You reognise this? Do you know who did it? Do you know how they did it, because this isn't natural, obviously, but I've never seen anything _near_ this scale before, is the whole ocean frozen or is it just this section? How long can it be held for? What energy source is it using? Is it some kind of stasis feild, or have they made the molecules inert, except that wouldn't work because then they'd just collapse and become unreactive, maybe a brion wave? No -"

They laugh. They can't help it, it just sort of escapes, like heat from an air balloon. Just when you think the facts can't get more impossible, the universe can't get more _incredible_ \- They want to steal it, keep it, take it apart and rebuild it better. They dance along the sand, careful to preserve Lance's footprints. They're pulling at their hair, suddenly too short.

"What kind of genius built this? Why, what could possibly be the point-"

"The Galra built it," Coran interrupts, "So they can keep the planet fresh for reaping."

Pidge's glee dies mid-skip. She suddenly notices how everyone is staring at her. Coran sighs, and it ruffles his moustache. Suddenly, it's not hard to imagine him with grey hair.

"I heard about these planets in the Belt, but I assumed it was just the usual rubbish, 'oh my parusha has six backs _and_ collapsable antlers, have you heard of the prophet Maligmas? He has toenails that change colour with the weather'. Or maybe I hoped." He smiles, " suppose the universe isn't playing by our rules anymore."

"What do you mean by 'harvest'?" Keith interupts.

"Well, the Galra scour the cosmos for undeveloped planets with the potential for life, and then use something - some kind of magical jiggery pokery - and freeze all life on a cellular level. Nothing dies. Nothing grows. Then they auction them off to the high ranking generals." Coran's frown looks unnatural; his face isn't used to making the shape. "Apparently caring for one is a great honour. They unfreeze the planet, and the General builds a base, uses his forces to manipulate and subjugate developing life -"

"What?" Pidge frowns "But that would take hundreds of millions of years at least!" Coran shrugs helplessly.

"However they've done it, the Galra have found the brake and gas pedals of evolution. There are entire worlds out there bred to be slaves for the empire, to suck their own homes dry of all natural resources. Then the commanding officer relinquishes his post and hands the planet over to Zarkon for something... other. Nobody knows what." he brightened, "Good news is, apparently the process takes up so much energy there are actually very few of them! Always a silver lining, eh?"

Everyone stares at him in silence. Lance's smile has splintered.

"Now, let's see exactly where we've ended up." Coran activates the diagnostics screen by the Castle entrance. Pidge steps forward; magic is just science trying to hide from her. Fire was magic before friction was given a name. She needs to understand, this, the greatest, most terrible, most phenomenal piece of science she's ever seen.

"But what about -"

Four symbols leap out at her, unmoved by the tide of information flowing across the screen.

Recognition flares, bright and terrible. The world turns to treacle.

Katie can't breath. The question has congealed in her throat like old peanut butter, she can't -

She stares at the date on the screen. Astral time, year, month, day. Each echoes oddly, in the ringing of her ears. The echo of the day before.

Matt's birthday.

Katie turns and runs into the Castle.

 **...**

 **A/N: Hi. I'm glad this fic has actually found an audience. Last I checked, VLD's representation on was criminally small, and I was incredibly intimidated by the tidal wave of Klance angst on ao3. To anyone who's got this far, thanks for trying me out! REVIEWS are the best, please say if you don't like something!**

 **Updates should be weekly-ish, but I'm not making firm promises.**

 **Thanks**


	3. Chapter 3

Lance watches Pidge go. Watches after she's gone, because the alternative is turning to face the beach again. He feels the breeze play across the back of his neck, the hushed breath of a predator lying in wait.

Keith sighs and mutters something about training. He slopes off. Two seconds, just to make sure.

 _One, two..._

Lance lets out a breath, and turns to face home. It's not. It's not home, he remembers that. Tries.

"You OK, man?" It's Hunk. Hunk's still here. Lance treats him to the full megawatt grin, no expense spared.

"Yeah! Course I'm OK, it's me, remember?"

Hunk smiles.

"You glad to be back by the water?"

"Yeah - yeah, should be fun. Bit of sun to touch up the tan. Should be great."

It's like a frame from one of those home movies Uncle Euquerio loved to make, with the entire family just out of shot. Lance desperately wants to tug them back into view, to see the grinning faces and hear the laughter crackle over the background rush of the tide. Delfia would have punched his shoulder and smiled, the little ones would've bowled him over and Cedro's hug would've nearly crushed his ribs.

He always seemed to get lost in those videos.

"Listen, man, I've got to, uh, go and check on Pidge. She looked pretty upset." He turns and walks away too fast, leaving Hunk to stand alone on the sand. It's a different colour than at home, he decides. Too pale. A ghost image.

He doesn't find Pidge. It's impossible to, if she wants to hide. That girl is small enough to curl up anywhere if she wants. Instead, he goes to his room, and stares at the fern sitting in the corner. Ferns, it turns out, are pretty common. Coran got him this one at the Belt market and passed it on when no one else was looking.

Lance never actively meant for it to be secret, it was just - private. Pidge would probably denounce it as alien because of some difference to Earth ferns in its microscopic pores or something, and that would ruin the point of it.

Keith - he shudders to think of how Keith might react. He doesn't know how, exactly, but he's sure it'll be in a super stupid way that will sting more than it's meant to, as per usual. Stupid Keith with his stupid face. Not that his face is particularly special, it just happens to be where Lance's eyes are drawn whenever -

Lance grabs the little spray bottle on the side and dampens the fern's leaves. Then he sits on the bed and watches it, in case his lifeline to Earth goes up in smoke, and tries to make up a lie convincing enough to stop him going out onto the beach again.

If he could surf, it would be better. Surfing cleared his head, helped him think. As a kid, Lance always wanted to have the waves to himself. Symptom of growing up with siblings; too many voices, too much noise.

Now he has his wish. An entire coast, maybe even an ocean to himself. But the water has hardened. It seems linked, in the weird, far off way the moon controls the tides. The moment Lance's family disappeared from the beach, so did the waves.

There's a knock at the door. Lance looks up, smirk in place, one-liner on the tongue -

It's Coran. The smirk relaxes a fraction.

"Ah, there you are! Wanted to talk to you about something. I see you've been watering Eustace."

"I - what?"

"Eustace! The fern!" Coran's moustache frumps like this should be obvious.

"You named my fern _Eustace?!_ "

"Well you weren't naming him. Poor little guy." Coran makes a face like the fern ( _not_ Eustace) is an adorable puppy.

"If I had named him, he wouldn't be _Eustace_." Lance makes a face like the name leaves a bad taste in his mouth. "That's like the most random name _ever_."

Coran sniffs haughtily, and Lance worries his moustache will disappear up his nose.

"I once knew a fine Portnark called Eustace. He had five feet, very lucky."

"Well yipee for him, but my fern is a she, not a he, and _her_ name is Fernzilla." Lance turns to the fern with an apologetic smile and a little bow. "I appologise for my freind and hereby dub thee Fernzilla."

The fern doesn't move, unimpressed. Something clicks in Lance's head and he turns back to Coran.

"You just got me to talk to a plant, didn't you?"

Coran's eyes twinkle.

"I got you to _name_ the plant. It's a proper pet now! Talking was just a hilarious side effect. And look, you're smiling, so it must be working. Coran strikes again!"

Lance shakes his head, smiling.

"Sly old man."

Coran's moustache is endangered by another sniff.

"I'll have you know I'm fashionably matured, thank you very much." He grins. "Now come on, I've got something to show you."

Lance follows him to the elevator, which takes them to a floor he's never been to before. Coran has a conspiritorial glint in his eye.

"Are you still missing home, Lance?"

Lance jumps, coughs (it's suddenly so hot in here) and looks at his feet.

"...Yeah."

"Well that's good, otherwise I'd have just wasted the last week!" Coran beams and leads him into a room. It's dawning on Lance these must be his private quaters, he never sees him on the acomodation floor. He feels slightly honoured, and pleased. It's about time someone around here recognised his awezsomeness. Now if only he can get the private tour from Allura too...

On a table, something hides under a white cloth.

Coran rushes over, childlike enthusiasim smoothing over the wrinkles on his face, and whips the cloth back like a magician unveiling a trick.

A smallish box lies there, halved by a glowing blue line. Wires sprout out of its every surface like acupuncture pins, trailing back to a panel in the wall. Some kind of lead or plug is attached to one side. The plug ends in a flatish peice of metal, with two circles of wire mesh at the top and bottom.

Lance leans forward to inspect it, rubbing his chin to hide confusion.

"Huh. So it's a... toaster?"

Coran looks outraged

"A toaster?" he squeaks, "It's a radio, for you to contact home! I had to sacrafice half a matching set of echo cubes to get this working, and let me tell you those are not easy to come by any more -"

"Wait." The truth reverses back into him like a truck that missed the first time, "You're saying that with this thing I can -"

"Contact your family, yes," Coran finishes, and starts to do that 'thinking hard' thing with his moustache. "Of course, it's completely experimental. Never built for this kind of thing. I was thinking we should run it past Hunk first -"

"No." Lance interrupts, holding up a hand. They're not telling Hunk for the same reason he didn't tell him about Fernzilla. Hunk's a great freind, but he can't keep a secret to save his life. Symptom of growing up with no siblings; he'd never had the need for privacy. And if Hunk knew, then Keith would know -

"Let's just keep this between us." for once, the full-watt smile isn't forced "Something between freinds. Can we test it now?"

Coran frowns, "I suppose, but..." then he says something sciencey, then something technical about dissonance frequencies Lance can't really hear over the war-drum beat of the blood in his ears.

He can talk to his family.

Something hungry and primal purs in his chest, in a den safe and sound and warm. Coran has stopped talking. He's looking at Lance expectantly. He can't get the words out fast enough.

"Let's do it!"

"As long as you're sure."

"It'll be a Lance classic!" For some reason this doesn't have the reassuring effect he hopes for, but Coran seems to trust his judgement. _Finally._

He whizzes about like a drevish, checking readings, tuning frequencies. Lance speaks his family's home number on instinct. He's branded the digits into memory. Coran enters them, then some galactic coordinates. The hunger builds like a physical force, pressure behind his temples.

Finally, after aeons, they are ready. He feels light headed; his feet aren't touching the floor, but he's proud of how steadily he holds the handset. _Stay cool, stay cool..._

Coran flicks a switch; the tangle of wires begins to hum.

For the first time in months, Lance hears a phone start to ring.

It almost breaks him, the stupid ringing. A sound as normal and boring and monotonous as breathing turns him to spun glass and water. His hand begins to shake.

No-one picks up.

Six rings, seven - **brr brr, brr brr,**

The wires on the echo box begin to shiver, unnaturally, from heat not cold.

 _Come on..._

 **brr brr, brr brr, brr brr,**

Coran opens his mouth, but Lance doesn't even let the words pass. The hunger is desperate now, clawing at his insides. _Not yet, come on, not yet..._

The wires begin to smoke. Lance is dimly aware he might break the handset, he's holding it so tight-

There is a click. A hiss. And then a voice. An actual, human voice. Do they sound different? He tries to remember, tries to ingrain every detail into memory.

"Hello?"

It's Atala. Of all of them, Lance expected him least. Pretending to be an adult by answering the phone.

"Hellooo, are you there?"

Lance hasn't said anything. This comes dully, like the aftershock of an earthquake. He grasps for words, but they come at him in battalions, all clamouring to be spoken. He can't choose.

The echo box begins to spark.

What can he say? To Atala, the youngest of all of them? His _abuela_ would've been better than this -

"Hello? Are you a weirdo?" Atala asks curiously, a billion trillion miles away, too in love with his grown up fantasy to put the phone down. Something finally escapes Lance's open mouth, caught between a sob and and a laugh.

"Hermano -" he says. And then the echo box explodes. Coran yanks him down as it throws the wires off like a porcupine firing its spines. Lance is crouched on the floor, the handset crushed to his ear, blinking too fast.

The line is dead. A hundred meaningless words sit unspoken on his tongue like a pile up on a freeway. Right now he only cares about three.

 _I miss you._

...

Keith can't decide if he loves or hates his bayard.

He's found his way down to the training deck, inevitably. Whenever all he wants to do is find a quiet corner and think, this happens instead. All roads end here, with a sword in his hand and sweat on his brow and enemies closing in for the kill.

The sparring droids lunge; he parries one, ducks another and swipes at a third; it's white torso is marshmallow under Longclaw's touch.

Red likes the name, Longclaw; it illicits a satisfied purr whenever Keith thinks of it. Long is right, long enough to keep everyone else at a safe distance, but with a hand-and-a-half grip so he can defend and attack on his own.

Another droid slashes at his face with a spear; Keith catches the blade on his own and presses forward, catching the hilt and twisting, putting all his body weight down. The spear flies off to the left; Keith feels a breeze and ducks just in time to miss another blade that would've skewered his head.

He has to remind himself he's in a controlled environment, and the Castle isn't out to get him. Sometimes that's difficult.

He rolls away and comes up swinging, taking first the droid on the left, then the right, still without it's spear. Longclaw is double edged, to fight enemies on both fronts.

And then the floor is empty; Keith is left alone with the sword and his thoughts. He adjusts his grip on the handle and studies it carefully. Elegant, ornate, even. Something a grand knight might weild a thousand years in the future. It feels wrong. Not physically; the blade is perfectly balanced. But - alien. Which is obvious, but also deeper, like he and the bayard were never meant to be.

He doesn't like the way it's moulded itself around him. He doesn't like the way it has judged him, the way he fights, the way he thinks.

Keith scowls and enters in another battle scenario. He's beaten them all, but there's something calming about the rhythm of the fight. The droids rise out of the ground, only two this time, and the red mist descends.

He sees himself yesterday, the shadow of a mime ghosting across the floor. The day before that, the week before, the month. He jabs with Longclaw, and in his peripheral the shadow Keiths do the same. He leads the dance, and they mirror his every move, soldiers marching in time. He wishes they'd tell him why he's always trapped down here, fighting faceless enemies that know him better than any of his team.

But even in his head the shadows' faces are blurred and grey, a sketch of what he should be erased and re-drawn too many times.

Keith wakes up long enough to dice the droids into pieces, then stops.

He wants to practice with his knife, partly to practice close-quaters combat, partly just to hold something that doesn't need a name, that isn't heavy with so much expectation. But that's wrong too.

Maybe it's just as simple as black and white, but the knife (handle worn soft from use, blade webbed with hairline scratches) doesn't fit the sterile whites and icy blues of the Castle. The Castle, the sword. Keith doesn't trust things so perfectly clean.

He plugs in another scenario and watches as the cracasses of the last round are swallowed by the uniform white. It's like they never existed, and in half a second another exactly like them stands where they once stood. The new droid's face is blank like the others. Mirror-like. For some reason it makes him shiver.

He stabs experimentally; the parry is swift and decisive, the counter-attack has him dancing back. Keith grins and reajusts his grip on the sword again. A challenge.

They circle each other, wary, and now it's not just the shadows copying him but the droid as well. He breaks, they clash, he retreats, it follows, their blades meet again. Keith pretends the ring of metal can cover up the pristine quiet of this flying mauseleum.

Normally it's not so bad; he's secretly greatful he spends so much time with Lance and his big mouth, but now, left with nothing but the echo of his own breath, Keith starts to miss people.

The Castle is not meant for so few, you can feel the unnatural absence in the air. It's meant to be full. An ark. Keith thinks of Coran and Allura, and a scrap of old rhyme comes back to him:

"The animals come in two by two..."

Dad had taught -

Keith loses patience and feints to the left. The droid falls for it and he guts the thing. It flounders like a fish on dry land.

They're on a war footing now. Shiro has just proven that. Stupid idiot, Keith should've been the one going last, but Shiro let sentiment get in the way. He's more like Allura than either of them realise. And Keith, being the idiot he is, let it happen, Because he respects Shiro.

Well, not next time. Next time he'll put his foot down. He doesn't respect Shiro enough to let him go down with the ship.

Shiro doesn't have a bayard. What's that like, not having to fight with an ugly reflection of yourself?

The next round emerges, and Keith buries himself in sweat and hard breath.

The Galra have the right idea, in a way. Block, slash, parry, counter. Sometimes strength and duty have to come first.

A droid nicks his elbow. Keith hisses and spins away, decapitating it. He'd better be careful, thinking things like this. Knowing his luck, King Alfor's projection is secretly psychic and he'll be ejected into space for herasy. But Allura has been asleep for ten thousand years, she needs to adapt.

Sometimes you have to fight fire with fire, and he's meant to be the fire guy, right? That's the elemet the Red Lion stands for. Guess that means the job falls to him.

Keith stands panting among the bodies of enemies slain. He misses Lance. And Hunk, and Pidge. He shakes it off, sets another training excrecise, pushes the sweat-matted hair out of his eyes, levels the sword, Longclaw. His hands itch for his knife.

Deep breaths, Centre. Shiro says calm and focus. Respect his teachings if you want him to respect yours. War footing. He'll fight the good fight, because it has to be won. If he doesn't like the weapons he's been given, he'll just turn the enemy's against them. What is it, the Galra say? Repeat Sun?

 _Repit Sah._


End file.
